The "News" thread.

[Rusty Edge]

"The boy told the snowplow driver that he was a dwarf and that he had forgotten his driver's license at home."

I've heard lots of stories over the years of children joyriding, running away from home, etc.
This excuse takes the cake!


But obviously he's old enough to know he wasn't supposed to do that, or he would have told the truth.  If he can figure that out, can't he see that he's too young to be responsible for an 18 month old?

[Buster's Uncle]

Girl Scout sells 117 cookie boxes in two hours outside pot dispensary
The Sideshow
By Eric Pfeiffer  1 hour ago



Danielle Lei outside the Green Cross dispensary (Green Cross/Facebook)


Want to sell a lot of Girl Scout Cookies? Set up shop outside a pot dispensary.

Just about everyone loves Girl Scout Cookies. And one 13-year-old girl came up with an ingenious strategy to significantly boost her sales: setting up shop outside a San Francisco medical marijuana dispensary.

In a major surprise to no one, it was a huge hit, with Danielle Lei selling 117 boxes in just two hours.

Danielle’s mother Carol said she supervised the sale on Monday and that it was the second time she’s allowed her two daughters to sell their Girl Scout Cookies outside of a Green Cross establishment.

"You put it in terms that they may understand," Carol said in an interview with Mashable, who first reported the story. "I'm not condoning it, I'm not saying go out in the streets and take marijuana [...] It also adds a little bit of cool factor. I can be a cool parent for a little bit."

And for a little context on just how intertwined these two things are,  one of the more popular and potent strains of medical marijuana is in fact called Girl Scout Cookies.

In fact, the website Leafly says that the Girl Scout Cookies strain was invented by San Francisco-based rapper Berner. So, in a manner of speaking, it’s all coming full circle.

Some chapters of the Girl Scouts have objected to the report but the Northern California branch that oversees Danielle’s area says they have no problem with her business strategy since it was conducted outside of a legal establishment.

"The mom decided this was a place she was comfortable with her daughter being at,” Dana Allen, director of marketing and communications for Girl Scouts of Northern California, told Mashable. "We're not telling people where they can and can't go if it's a legitimate business."

For it’s part, the Green Cross dispensary fully supported the move. And employees were not immune from the lure of Tagalongs and other popular cookies varieties, reportedly buying several boxes themselves.

They’ve also been making jokes about the story on their Facebook page, including a play on the “most interesting man alive” advertising campaign that reads, “I don’t always buy Girl Scout Cookies But when I do, I buy them from the genius outside the Green Cross pot dispensary.”

Of course, let’s not credit all of Danielle’s success to geographic luck. While she did experience a measurable uptick in sales outside the pot dispensary, she also managed to sell 80 boxes during a comparable two-hour period outside a local Safeway grocery store.

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/girl-scout-sells-117-cookie-boxes-in-two-hours-outside-pot-dispensary-230640827.html


-You may laugh now.

[Geo]

Heh. Wonder if this girl wiill wind up in a sales(wo)men job in 10 years.

[gwillybj]

A-10 Warthog on the Pentagon chopping block. Why?

A-10 Warthog, if eliminated, would save $3.5 billion in Pentagon spending. But supporters of the A-10 Warthog say it has been key to close-air support missions in Afghanistan and Iraq.

By Bradley Klapper, Associated Press / February 26, 2014

WASHINGTNO

Lawmakers signaled a difficult battle ahead for the Obama administration's plan to dramatically overhaul the nation's military, voicing opposition Tuesday to proposed cuts in benefit packages, long-standing weapons programs and bases that mean money and jobs across America.

Speaking to reporters, Levin said the Pentagon's proposal to scrap the Air Force's A-10 "Warthog" Thunderbolt tank-killer aircraft would be a particularly tough sell. Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., said scrapping the plane was a "serious mistake" and vowed to fight it.

Retiring the A-10, nicknamed the Warthog, will save $3.5 billion over five years, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said. The Air Force has a fleet of more than 300 Warthogs that provide air support for ground troops. Meanwhile, the Pentagon also plans to ground its U-2 spy planes, replacing them with the unmanned Global Hawk, according to Fox News.

For now, Northrop Grumman (NOC), Boeing (BA) and Lockheed Martin (LMT) can compete for Thunderbolt Life Cycle Program Support contracts to do work for the fleet A-10 aircraft. The Air Force awarded Northrop Grumman two work orders worth $24 million in November, and one of the contracts called for the defense company to maintain the A-10 until at least 2028.

The A-10, which entered service in the 1970s, was designed to take out Soviet tanks. While it hasn’t been in production for years, the aircraft is known for being proficiently used to conduct close-air support missions, up through the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Hagel said it was a “close call” to drop the A-10, but he backed the decision to retire what he called an outdated aircraft. The Air Force has indicated before that it could retire the A-10 with Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter on the way. Its plan calls for replacing the A-10 with the F-35 in the early 2020s, Hagel said.

"We have been cutting and cutting for the last five years," said Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., the Senate Armed Services Committee's top Republican.

The skepticism from both Republicans and Democrats augured poorly for Hagel's vision of shrinking the Army to its smallest size in three-quarters of a century and creating a nimbler force more suited to future threats than the large land wars in Iraq and Afghanistan over the last decade. Tuesday's advance of a new veterans bill also suggested Congress may be more interested in increasing military spending in a midterm election year.

The cuts "will weaken our nation's security while the threats we face around the world are becoming more dangerous and complex," Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham, two leading GOP hawks, said in a joint statement. "Now is not the time to embrace a defense posture reminiscent of the years prior to World War II," they said, without outlining substitute cost reductions.

Although Congress has agreed on keeping next year's military budget just under $500 billion, major tradeoffs must still be made to get under the cap.

Tensions exist in both parties. GOP hawks are lining up against tea party supporters keen to rein in spending, while Democrats backing the Obama administration must deal with colleagues from military-heavy districts and states fretful about the potential fallout. Automatic spending cuts that landed heavily on the military were only eased somewhat by a budget agreement two months ago.

The evidence since then suggests appetite is waning for difficult decisions on defense reductions, especially as the nation gears up for congressional elections in November.

Two weeks ago, the House and Senate overwhelmingly eliminated a cut in veterans' benefits of less than 1 percent that lawmakers themselves enacted only in December. On Tuesday, a Democratic bill expanding health, education and other benefits for veterans at a cost of $21 billion over the next decade unanimously cleared an initial hurdle, with the Senate voting 99-0 in favor of starting debate.

"There's a lot of need in the veterans community," said Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., who sponsored the legislation.

Still, the measure faces an uncertain future. Some Republicans consider it a campaign season ploy by Democrats to force them to oppose helping veterans. The House has approved some of the benefit improvements in Sanders' bill, but Republicans controlling that chamber oppose other parts and want other ways of financing the costs.

"We don't have enough money right now, in my view, to defend the nation," Graham told reporters. The South Carolina senator added: "I want to help veterans, but we got to have a sense of priority here."

More is at stake when it comes to the plan Hagel unveiled Monday, which would shrink the active-duty Army from 522,000 soldiers to between 440,000 and 450,000 — making it the smallest since just before the U.S. entered World War II. The time frame for the reduction wasn't specified.

Hagel said it was necessary to reshape forces to confront a "more volatile, more unpredictable world." The nation can afford the smaller military so long as it retains a technological edge and the agility to respond on short notice to crises anywhere on the globe, he said.

President Barack Obama will submit the budget to Congress next week.

A hearing Tuesday of the Senate Armed Services Committee provided a glimpse at some of the debates that await the plan.

Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., the chairman, asked Obama's nominee for the No. 2 post at the Pentagon to justify the smaller pay rises and reductions in housing allowances, health benefits and other subsidies for service members and retirees.

"We want to compensate our men and women for everything that they do for their nation, but we need to slow down the growth of personnel compensation so that we can spend more money on readiness and modernization," said Robert Work, a former top Navy official nominated to be deputy secretary of state.

"We have to make some savings," added Michael McCord, nominee for undersecretary of defense. He said civilian and military compensation comprises half of the Pentagon's budget.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., doubted the economic arguments behind closing bases in the United States and urged cuts overseas instead. Work suggested the military was studying reducing capacities in Europe, too.

Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine sought assurances the Navy would maintain a fleet of 11 aircraft carriers — a vital issue in his state of Virginia, where carriers are often based and repaired.

Polls show the American public split on the overall issue of defense spending. Republican voters are more likely to say it should be higher while Democratic voters are more likely to say it should be lower. But maintaining bases and manufacturing operations becomes much more sensitive when it affects jobs close to home.

Governors, too, have entered the fray over plans to transfer equipment from Army National Guard units. Some in Congress oppose almost any cuts at all.

"We have been cutting and cutting for the last five years," said Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., the Senate Armed Services Committee's top Republican.

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Latest-News-Wires/2014/0226/A-10-Warthog-on-the-Pentagon-chopping-block.-Why

[gwillybj]

Definitely one for the yearbook:

Firefighters Dramatically Rescue College Freshman Stuck in Tree

The Daily Caller

It’s only Wednesday, but a freshman at Pacific University has almost certainly locked up this week’s award for America’s stupidest student already.

The unidentified 18-year-old student managed to get herself stuck in a redwood tree near the library on the campus of the smallish private school in Forest Grove, Ore., reports The Oregonian.

The incident happened on Tuesday. It’s not clear when the student shimmied up the tree or how long she had been stuck there. Campus security called the local fire department around 5 p.m.

The distressed student was stranded at a place in the tree about 20 feet off the ground.

Michael Kinkade, Forest Grove’s fire chief, arrived on the scene first. He helpfully pitched a jacket up to the student so she could stay warm.

A full crew arrived later with a big 24-foot ladder and everything. With their help, the adventurous student was able to descend from the tree unharmed.

According to fire department spokesman Dave Nemeyer, the student explained her behavior to the fire chief by saying that she frequently climbs trees as a hobby. She noted that she is usually – usually – able to get down without assistance from several firefighters.

Nemeyer said the fire department doesn’t respond to many calls about adults stuck in trees. He recalled that there had been a local 12-year-old trapped in a tree fairly recently.

“That’s usually around the age range we’re dealing with on these calls,” he observed.

The leafy campus of Pacific University is located about 25 miles west of Portland. It’s home to a famously large number of trees including ginkgos, Douglas firs, bigleaf maples and giant sequoias.

Follow Eric on Twitter and on Facebook, and send education-related story tips to erico[at]dailycaller[dot]com.

http://news.yahoo.com/firefighters-dramatically-rescue-college-freshman-stuck-tree-132513064.html

[Geo]

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Latest-News-Wires/2014/0226/A-10-Warthog-on-the-Pentagon-chopping-block.-Why

Why don't those legislators try to channel defense cuts to say coast guard budgets? Like increased patrol vessels to try intercept more of the seabased drug traffiking? Pretty sure this would help bringdown the costs of drug addict programs in the mid-long run.

[gwillybj]

Oklahoma Father Dies in Police Encounter After Mother Slaps Daughter

(CNN) -- It was supposed to be a fun family outing to the movies, but Nair Rodriguez's 19-year-old daughter got under her skin. They fought, she said, and she slapped her daughter.

Moments later, police arrived on a domestic dispute call at the Moore, Oklahoma, theater and did not confront Nair Rodriguez but rather her husband, Luis. They took him down, and after the encounter on February 15, he was dead.

Cell phone video taken by Nair Rodriguez and released this week shows the final minutes of the takedown.

Nair Rodriguez accuses officers of brutality. Police say they were following protocol and used no undue force, although three officers have been suspended with pay.

Argument, upset

The mother-daughter spat upset the mother so badly that she bolted for the family car. Her husband, Luis, followed her to calm her down, family attorney Michael Brooks-Jimenez told reporters.

That's when a group of police and theater security officers turned up, he said.

There were three of them -- one working off-duty security at the theater and two active-duty officers already there to deal with two drunk patrons who'd passed out -- according to Moore police spokesman Sgt. Jeremy Lewis. (In addition, two Oklahoma state game wardens were working as off-duty security at the theater, state wildlife department spokesman Micah Holmes said.)

As the two on-duty Moore officers were leaving, a person ran into the lobby and told them about some kind of domestic dispute outside, Lewis said.

What happened next is disputed.

Nair Rodriguez has said officers beat Luis Rodriguez, CNN affiliate KFOR reported. But Moore Police Chief Jerry Stillings calls the actions of his officers "reasonable."

He would not go into much detail and said an investigation is under way. But he mentioned police used pepper spray, CNN affiliate KOCO reported.

Luis Rodriguez ended up on the ground with five men pinning him down, and Nair Rodriguez pulled out a cell phone.

Her fearful cries fill the recording.

"Luis! Luis!" she calls out frantically. Her husband does not respond and does not appear to move.

She calls to the officers to assure her that he is alright.

"Please somebody tell me that he is alive," she implores. "He is not moving."

The officers appear calm. One tells her that he will talk to her once they are finished securing her husband.

Then one walks over to the camera. He tells her that police have called in a medical unit to check on her husband.

It wasn't him

The officer says police received a call about domestic violence before confronting her husband.

It wasn't him, Nair Rodriguez tells him. "I hit my daughter," she says. She wants to know why they have pinned down her husband.

"He refused to give his ID," the officer said. "He got combative."

She notices blood on the officer. "Is he bleeding?" she demands to know.

"I'm bleeding; that's me," the officer says.

An ambulance can be seen in the background, and Luis Rodriguez is lifted onto a stretcher.

The video ends shortly afterward.

Cause of death

An autopsy may reveal more about why Luis Rodriguez died, and surveillance camera footage of the encounter in the movie theater parking lot may reveal what happened before his wife pulled out her cell phone camera.

What police describe as normal procedure, lawyer Brooks-Jimenez describes as something brutal and possibly deadly -- pepper spray to the face and the weight of five men on top of him.

CNN has reached out to Brooks-Jimenez for further comment.

Lewis, from the Moore Police Department, said that three officers from his department who were involved in this incident have been suspended with pay while the Oklahoma Bureau of Investigation reviews the incident. The two game wardens working security that day at the theater are continuing in their normal roles, according to Holmes of the state wildlife department.

An autopsy on Luis Rodriguez was conducted on February 16, said Amy Elliott from Oklahoma's office of the chief medical examiner. His body was released four days later, but Rodriguez's full report won't be released until toxicology results come in, adds Elliott.

Regardless of when that happens, the Rodriguez family may have to wait for closure.

The Oklahoma Bureau of Investigation doesn't anticipate it will make any findings for months, according to spokeswoman Jessica Brown.

CNN's Tristan Smith contributed to this report.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/26/justice/oklahoma-arrest-death-video/index.html
video at article

[gwillybj]

^ I hope whoever called the police over a slap feels real good about not minding their own f**king business.

[gwillybj]

Surprise! Baby Born on New York City Sidewalk
By ABC News | ABC News Blogs – 17 hours ago

It's no secret that trying to hail a cab during rush hour in New York City is a thankless task, but one would think that a woman in labor trying to get to the hospital would be an exception.

Not so for New Yorker Polly McCourt, who delivered her daughter on a city sidewalk Monday after another woman stole her cab.

"He was trying desperately to hail a cab," McCourt, 39, said of the doorman of her Manhattan building who came to her aid after she went into labor around 4 p.m. while inside her family's apartment.

"A lady walked out five minutes in front and hailed the cab and got into it," McCourt told local reporters from her hospital bed. "I went, 'No, that's my cab.'"

With the baby well on its way, McCourt told the doorman, identified by the New York Daily News as Anton Rudovic, that she was not going to make it to the hospital. "I turned around and said, 'I need to actually sit down,'" she recalled.

With McCourt in labor on the sidewalk, propped up by Rudovic, strangers came to her aid.

In video captured by nearby cameras, a crowd can be seen gathering around McCourt, with some strangers giving her their scarves to help her stay warm in the chilly weather.

Paramedics arrived just in time to pull the baby out and take McCourt to a nearby hospital, where both mom and baby are doing fine.

"She's a real New Yorker," McCourt said of her daughter, whom she named Ila Isabelle. "She's born on the streets of New York."

McCourt's daughter will always know too of the generosity that brought her into the world, thanks to her middle name.
McCourt says she had planned to give her daughter the middle name of Polly, but instead changed it to Isabelle after a woman who gave McCourt the coat off her back to stay warm.

"I'm getting emotional just thinking about it," McCourt said.

Ila Isabelle is the third child for McCourt and her husband, Cian McCourt, who was stuck in the Lincoln Tunnel during his wife's surprise delivery and arrived at their home minutes after his daughter's birth, according to the Daily News.

http://gma.yahoo.com/blogs/abc-blogs/surprise-baby-born-york-city-sidewalk-161145048--abc-news-parenting.html
video w/stills at article

[Rusty Edge]

"A-10 Warthog on the Pentagon chopping block. Why?"

The age old reason, US & THEM.

Once upon a time, The US Army had it's Army Air Corps. If a P-47 Thunderbolt was sent to escort strategic bombers or strafe the German Army, it was all in a day's work. After WWII, we created an independent air force and fought the Cold and Korean Wars.

The Air Force was about strategic missions and dogfighting. It was glamorous. It affected budgeting and recruiting.  In VietNam they found that the supersonic fighter/bombers weren't that great at ground attack and close air support. They actualy got better results with slower propeller aircraft. Helicopters couldn't carry enough ordinance.

So the Pentagon ordered the design and creation of a specific ground attack/close air support plane. It produced the A-10, designed to fight at 4000 feet at 350 mph, and able to fly back on manual control, even if it lost one engine, one flap, one tail, half a wing and both hydraulic systems. With a 30mm tank killer canon.

Fortunately the Cold War ended, and it was never even used. We stopped building them. Then Desert Storm happened and they proved to be the most useful planes in the war, and lots of countries wanted them.

  Well, that came out later. So did the news that the air force wanted to prove they could win the war by themselves  with smart bombs. They were actually diverting strikes against Iraqi troop positions to strategic targets, until Swartzkopf's #2 threatened to choke an Air Force General's tongue out of his head. Our unfortunate Air Force achieved air superiority before any of our pilots could make ace.

The solution is to move all of these A-10s  to the reserves ( to be used when there is a war), or transfer them to the army. The Army already has helicopters and is interested. They often ask for A-10 support specifically.

The US Marines have their own Helicopters, Harrier jump jets , and Hornets, preferring to keep close air support in house.

The Air Force wants to go exclusively with the multi-role fighter, even though it won't fill the A-10's role as well.

[Buster's Uncle]

Is this an article or you talking?

[Buster's Uncle]

John Boehner gets in on the joke about his name
"It's Boner."
Chris Moody, Yahoo News
By Chris Moody, Yahoo News  1 hour ago



John Boehner (ABC News)


Childhood surely wasn't easy for young John Boehner, who one images faced a tornado of teasing from kids who willfully mispronounced his name. His family pronounces it "Bayner."

But shed no tears for the gentleman from Ohio, because these days, as the most powerful member of the House of Representatives, he's clearly taking it in stride. When a reporter accidentally referred to him as "Mr. Camp" during a press conference on Thursday, Boehner played along.

"It's 'Boner,'" he replied before the reporter could correct himself. "Boner."

Even in adulthood, as this 1991 video shows, his own colleagues mispronounced his name.

John Boehner Name Fail

And so have members of the media.

Joy Behar: Presumptive Speaker Of The House "John Boner"

http://news.yahoo.com/john-boehner-pronunciation-194225620.html

[Rusty Edge]

Is this an article or you talking?

This was me talking. You know how I get.
A number of my family used to work for Fairchild industries. The Reserves used to fly them over our farm, practicing staying under the radar.  I like to talk about them.

Here something factual- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairchild_Republic_A-10_Thunderbolt_II
There's a lot there at the end about "proposed retirement".

As for desert storm, my comments come from an episode of "Frontline".


Sometimes our weapon systems suck, and are a waste of lives and money. B-1, Osprey

Sometimes they suck, but they get fixed. The F111's were called "F-1 Lemons " in Viet Nam, but they kept working on them, they were the glory of Desert Storm because they were the original smart bomb delivery platform.

Sometimes we get something right, like the A-10. 

[Buster's Uncle]

I liked that post - I've seen the Warthog mentioned in context of the cutbacks this week, and you have both educated me and made a persuasive case.  Sometimes the old classics are best.

I remember commenting to my dad back in the 90s that the Osprey looked like a hideously slow plane that converted into a hideously underpowered 'copter - if you survived the transition.  Would I happen to have hit close to the problem with the thing?

[Rusty Edge]

Yeah, that's the Osprey troubles.

It was worth a try. Helicopters are expensive and time consuming to maintain, and it doesn't take much damage to knock them down. When they do, they drop almost straight down, there's no glide. I had a guy in my social circle who'd been a helicopter crash investigator in Viet Nam. Helicopters  get bad MPGs.

The A-10 was a success, why not try to design a plane to do the helicopter's job, and get more range, speed, and damage endurance from the same amount of fuel?

Likewise there's the matter of airships. Great anti-sub weapons. They can stay airborne a long time. The trouble with lighter than air craft is they have to be huge and light to distribute the weight. They never withstand wind shear.  For some reason there's always wild weather over the oceans. Senator Goldwater, ( a major general in the air force reserves who had flown 165 different types of aircraft) was an airship enthusiast.


Here's an out-of the box solution to the Osprey. Buy helicopters from the Russians. They tend to be better with helicopters and hovercraft. They could probably produce them at lower cost, too.
Well, we know Obama and Putin, buddies that they are, wouldn't work that one out.


The airforce also wants to go with more drones.  If I were the foot soldier in dire need of close air support, I'd want a human pilot on site, not some gamer on a joy stick back at base who can be electronically jammed, and might have a hard time telling friend from foe.